Latin America needs more than 2,000 new passenger aircraft in next 20 years

Airlines in the region enjoying second highest traffic growth in the world

According to the recently released Airbus Global Market Forecast (GMF), Latin America will require 2,028 new passenger aircraft of more than 100 seats between today and 2030, including 1,653 single-aisle, 334 twin-aisle and 41 very large aircraft and estimated at $197 billion.

At a time when the global economy is trying to stabilize, Latin America’s GDP is growing faster than the world at an average annual rate of 5 percent, while the region’s middle class is expected to surge 75 percent in the next 20 years.

Latin American airline traffic will follow suit, growing more than 6 percent per year in the next 20 years, the second highest growth rate in the world after the Middle East and before Asia Pacific. Overall, the region’s traffic is expected to triple in the next 20 years. Intraregional and domestic traffic in Latin America is predicted to rise 6.6 percent in the next 10 years, a faster rate than the 5.4 percent world average. Europe and North America will remain the most important long-haul markets for the region and are expected to reach a share of 31 percent and 25 percent respectively by 2030, while interregional and domestic traffic will dominate market share at 35 percent.

“Latin America’s aviation sector has boomed in the last five years and as a result it has never been stronger. Economic growth is enabling the rise of a new travelling middle class,” said Rafael Alonso, Executive Vice President of Airbus for Latin American and the Caribbean. “The region is also setting global standards by flying some of the youngest aircraft in the world average and advocating for the environment via aviation bio-fuel efforts that are both commercially viable and environmentally sustainable.”

To date, market forecasts have been released for Brazil, Mexico and Colombia. Highlights include:

• Brazil, the largest and fastest growing market for Airbus in Latin America, will require 701 new passenger aircraft of more than 100 seats between today and 2030. The 501 single-aisle, 174 twin-aisle aircraft and 26 very large aircraft have an estimated value of $82 billion. In the past decade, the country’s international and domestic air travel more than doubled, and in the next 20 years GDP will skyrocket 144 percent, 20 percent higher than regional average.

• Mexico will need 412 new passenger aircraft of more than 100 seats between today and 2030. The 371 single-aisle and 41 twin-aisle aircraft forecasted have an estimated market value of $30.5 billion. Considered one of the biggest metropolitan areas of the world based on population growth, international traffic to and from Mexico City grew by almost 90 percent in the last decade.

• Colombia has a demand for 135 new passenger aircraft of more than 100 seats between today and 2030. The 102 single-aisle and 33 twin-aisle aircraft have an estimated value of $13.7 billion. The country’s domestic air traffic grew nearly 80 percent in the past 10 years and international traffic to and from Colombia more than doubled between 2003 and 2011. Colombia’s fleet with more than 100 seats is also among the youngest in the world with an average age of four years, six years younger than the Latin American and world average.

With more than 600 aircraft sold and a backlog of nearly 300, over 400 Airbus aircraft are in operation throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. In the last 10 years, Airbus has tripled its in-service fleet, while delivering more than 60 percent of all aircraft operating in the region.

Note to editors:

The Airbus Global Market Forecast gives a detailed analysis of world air transport developments, covering 300 distinct passenger and freight traffic flows, as well as a year-by-year fleet evolution of the world’s aircraft operators, through fleet analysis of nearly 750 passenger airlines and 190 freighter operators over the next 20 years. In doing so, the forecast covers aircraft demand from the regional market to the very largest aircraft available, the A380 today.